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Joker: Folie à Deux Review
Image Credit: Niko Tavernise/Warner Bros.
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Directed By: Todd Phillips
Written By: Todd Phillips and Scott Silver; Based on the DC comics and character
Runtime: 139 minutes
MPA Rating: Rated R for some strong violence, language throughout, some sexuality, and brief full nudity.
Joaquin Phoenix – Arthur Fleck/Joker
Lady Gaga – Lee Quinzel/Harley Quinn
Catherine Keener – Maryanne Stewart
Brendan Gleeson – Jackie Sullivan
Harry Lawtey – Harvey Dent
Bill Smitrovich – Judge Herman Rothwax
Steve Coogan – Paddy Meyers
Zazie Beets – Sophie Dumond
Leigh Gill – Gary Puddles
Ken Leung – Dr. Victor Liu
Jacob Lofland – Ricky Meline
Sharon Washington – Debra Kane
Alfred Rubin Thompson – Ernie Bullock
Filmmaker Todd Phillips revisits the oppressive, decadent realm of his 2019 award-winning crime drama, Joker, with the ill-advised follow-up, Joker: Folie à Deux. Joaquin Phoenix once again returns to the role of sadly tragic Arthur Fleck (Phoenix), the struggling comedian and party clown who became a killer in the previous. Joker: Folie à Deux certainly has its heart in the right place in many respects, but the story tediously lumbers on for nearly two-and-a-half hours, failing to find any meaningful foothold. Even the presence of pop star Lady Gaga as a potential partner-in-crime for Fleck, Lee Quinzel, and multiple dull musical numbers fail to add any whimsy or meaning to this nihilistic enterprise.
The original Joker worked fine as a standalone character piece. Despite minuscule references to the DC Universe, Joker shared very little in common with the DC Comics supervillain and longtime adversary to Batman. Instead, Phillips, co-writer Scott Silver, and Phoenix utilized a sparse amount of DC Universe elements to craft a fairly unrelated story about a sad, put-upon, and tragic individual who lashes and becomes a “Joker-like” figure in a world where figures like Batman and The Joker will never exist. Here is the long and short of it: Arthur Fleck is Joker. He’s not The Joker. With that in mind, Phillips and Phoenix offered a fine, gritty crime drama showing how a mentally disturbed person gets pushed over the edge in becoming a psychotic killer. Joker shared close to nothing in common with its DC comic book roots. For a one-off standalone character study, that’s fine, but Phillips ruined that idea by crafting an unnecessary sequel, which brings us to Joker: Folie à Deux.
Folie à Deux picks up about two years after the end of the last movie. Fleck is now an inmate in the E-Ward of the dilapidated Arkham Asylum, awaiting his trial for the murders he committed. Arthur looks to be in a rut as he wastes away physically and mentally. However, he soon finds inspiration with the arrival of an attractive young woman to Arkham, Lee Quinzel (Gaga). Quinzel appears to be an emotional equal to Arthur, but she’s attracted to Fleck’s Joker persona. She encourages Arthur to bring out the fantasy world he created, which emerges in the form of love songs and musical numbers they share.
Unfortunately, while Arthur’s genuinely caring lawyer, Maryanne Stewart (Catherine Keener), seeks to better her client’s situation, Arthur continues to play into Quinzel’s fantasy ideals. Through Quinzel, Arthur finally gains some of the adulation he sought as a comedian years prior. She represents a microcosm of the fame and celebrity surrounding Arthur, a byproduct of his notoriety. He not only became a twisted folk hero for the general public of Gotham City but his exploits were dramatized in a TV movie. The problem is that Quinzel does not care about Arthur. She wants Joker. Arthur fails to recognize her game because he’s blinded by the joy of a woman finally giving him the attention he always craved.
The one area where Phillips and Phoenix succeed in Folie à Deux is how they craft Arthur into a tragic, pitiful figure. Arthur’s previous actions were abhorrent, but the films portray Arthur as a sad, abused man who reaches his breaking point. His actions were at least partially symptomatic of the social and moral decay plaguing Gotham City. Phillips and Silver likely had a point to prove by answering the critics who found the previous movie problematic with its messaging. Their script does present Arthur as far more tragically sympathetic in this follow-up, but the way the plot gets to that point is an absolute slog.
The musical aspect adds little to the overall presentation. Phoenix doesn’t have the right voice or pitch for the songs, so much so that Lady Gaga takes over many singing portions in their duets during the film’s latter half. His voice sounds nasal, wheezing, and buried under decades of abuse from chain smoking. That might be accurate based on Arthur’s emaciated physique, but the musical numbers unfold as flights of fancy unfurling from Arthur and Lee’s imaginations. So, they should be more capable singers and vocal performers in their fantasy sequences. If anything, the musical numbers significantly drag the narrative’s pacing. The film constantly builds for tenuous blow-ups to happen, raising the tension high enough to break. The more explosive moments tend to occur far too late after the suspense builds to a fever pitch and subsides. The moment window has already passed.
The biggest problem born out of Folie à Deux‘s existence is ruining the ambiguity of the original feature. Joker was not perfect, but it built a strong veneer of ambiguity by depicting the events through Arthur’s perspective, who the plot established as an unreliable narrator. Folie à Deux goes back on the ambiguity set up by the original, tying up any of the loose threads or burning questions left by the previous movie. These ideas play out in the form of characters from the first movie who reprise their roles as witnesses during Arthur’s trial, such as Zazie Beets as Arthur’s former neighbor Sophie Dumond. Getting answers to the questions of what happened to characters from the original feels remarkably unsatisfying. The sequel forcibly breaks apart the original’s mystique.
Lady Gaga’s work as Lee Quinzel is functional at best. The plot presents this version of Harley Quinn as an obsessed fangirl. While fans lament the story not taking more of a Bonnie & Clyde type of route with the characters, even that version likely wouldn’t have worked. Folie à Deux is not the origin story or beginning of The Joker and Harley Quinn. Other than their names and minor references to other DC Universe concepts and ideas, they are wholly independent of anything resembling their comic book counterparts. It amounts to a gloriously dull, disappointing experience.
Joker: Folie à Deux plays out as an underwhelming, unwanted epilogue to a film that didn’t need it. The film represents the traps of franchises, sequels, and IP. There is sometimes value in leaving well enough alone and quitting while you’re ahead. The encore everyone wanted falls flat on its face, much like poor Arthur does throughout the film. Like the Judy Collins song says, “Where are the clowns? There ought to be clowns.” Sadly, they’re here, and they aren’t that good.
